School Lunch In A Bento Box (with videos)

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It is said in Japan that when you eat from a bento lunch prepared by a loved one, the preparers feelings for you are transmitted through the food. Lovely!

As the school year gets underway, nutritious and non-nutritious school lunches continues to be important to families. It’s also been on my mind since I wrote, Pack School Lunches With DIY Eco-Love too. Possibly, the biggest boost in awareness came from Jamie Oliverís Food Revolution series last year. If you havenít seen his TED talk that started the whole Food Revolution, I highly recommend viewing it below.

Although there are some fine DIY alternatives to packing a school lunch, not everyone wants to make their own packaging. Why not consider a Bento Box?

Why Bento Boxes?
Besides the loviní mom and dad “feelings transmitted through the food,” Bento boxes make sense because kids tend to be picky eaters. Bento containers are divided into small compartments. Itís kind of like a jewelry box for food! A traditional bento is a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal, usually in a box-shape. I like the Zojirushi Bento Boxes (video below) because they add a new twist on packing school lunches. The stacked insulated thermos keeps hot things hot and cold things cold. The set also comes with a forked spoon, reusable chopsticks and a carrying tote.

Why stainless?
The typical school lunch is packed in a plastic container – easy to wash, easy to dispose and replace when it breaks down. Unfortunately, many plastics also contain BPA. The alternatives are glass or stainless. Glass is obviously not a safe choice for kids, making stainless the star.

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Ronnie Citron-Fink is a writer, editor and educator. She has written hundreds of articles about sustainable living, the environment, design, and family life for websites, books and magazines. Ronnie is the creator of Econesting, and the managing editor of Moms Clean Air Force. Ronnie was named one of the Top Ten Living Green Experts by Yahoo. Ronnie lives in New York with her family.

60 comments

Beautiful! I think I will go with the plastic freezer boxes for now, there are small ones and larger ones, and pack everything in the insulated lunch box with the ice pack below. Our lunch box also has room for a small thermos and a place for cutlery and a NAPKIN! all that is needed is the actual food and it is a gourmet lunchbox.

I hated cafeteria food but was lucky enough to have a mom who gladly made us each brown bag lunches every day that were the envy of all our friendsone of whom I always split my sandwich with. I always requested roast beef with lettuce, onion, and butter on a hard roll, and she always included a container of bell peppers and carrots, a piece of fruit, and a couple of homemade cookies for dessert. Thanks, Mom! If only we'd had bento boxes, the unpacking would have been as enjoyable as the eating : )

we have a similar one from: www.blueberrybaby.org
my 3 1/2 yea old has had it for about a year and LOVES it. pieces always come back because it is special to him... he always notices if i put a regular fork in instead of the one that came with the set.